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XP restarts during boot-up

J

Jugdish

n00b
Joined
Oct 4, 2004
Messages
9
My computer has just developed an annoying little quirk: it spontaneously restarts in the middle of Windows start-up. I have Windows XP Pro SP2, and every time it gets to the part of booting up where the little gray bars fill up across the bottom of the screen (right before the Windows logo is displayed on a black background), it will all of a sudden just restart and go back to the BIOS screen. So basically, it can never get past this point, and fails to give me any sort of message or information as to what exactly the problem is.

Here's a little video in case it's not clear what part of boot-up I'm talking about.

Even stranger is how the problem started: I was just doing typical everyday work on the computer when everything froze, the mouse cursor disappeared, and it would not respond to any input. I had to do a hard restart, and that's when the boot-up problem began.

This is not the first time this boot-up restarting thing has happened either. The first time I experienced it was a week ago and I ended up doing a clean re-install of Windows to fix it. But apparently that wasn't good enough, because it has resurfaced. So rather than re-install Windows again, I'd like to find out once and for all what the cause is.

Here is what I've already done to try to troubleshoot this:

1. I tried to start up using "Last Known Good Configuration", but this didn't fix anything.

2. I tried to start up in Safe Mode, but again, the same problem.

3. I tried to enable Boot Logging so I could see at what point exactly the problem was happening, but it never seems to produce the boot log file...or at least I can't ever find it. After enabling Boot Logging, and the boot-up fails, I enter the Recovery Console and try to find the "C:\WINDOWS\Ntbtlog.txt" file, but it is never there.

4. Next I started to remove pieces of hardware from my system one-by-one, trying to boot up after each one to see if it fixed anything. Now the only things plugged into my motherboard are my video card and one hard drive. Still, same problem.

5. Then I decided to get drastic and starting disabling start-up Services using the Recovery Console. I wrote down all the services marked as "SERVICE_BOOT_START", meaning they get loaded during the boot phase. I disabled them one at a time and discovered that the problem was still happening when all of them were disabled, except for the "ATAPI" service. The catch there is that when I disabled "ATAPI" I got a Stop message during boot-up that said it could not continue because it couldn't find the "C:\WINDOWS\System32\Drivers\Ntfs.sys" file. So I can't say whether or not the "ATAPI" service is the one at fault for this spontaneous restarting business, because I have no way of checking for a successful boot-up when it is disabled.

Anyway, I've pretty much reached the end of my rope now, and I'm getting sick of re-installing Windows XP to fix this problem every time, since the true cause is something deeper than that. Any suggestions?

Here are my system specs (keep in mind only the video card and Maxtor 5T06H6 are hooked up at this point):
OS: Windows XP Pro SP2
Motherboard: ABIT KG7-RAID
CPU: AMD AthlonXP 1800+ (not overclocked)
Memory: 2x256MB Crucial CT3272Y265
Video Card: Sapphire ATI Radeon 9550SE
Sound Card: Creative Labs SoundBlaster Audigy Platinum
Network Cards: 3Com 3C905CX-TXM, D-Link DWL-520+
Hard Drives: Maxtor 5T06H6, Maxtor 6Y120P0, Maxtor 6Y200P0
CD Drives: Toshiba SD-M1502, Ricoh RW7200A

Thanks for reading all this
 
Update:

Ok, I have tried out all the things people have suggested so far: I swapped memory modules, did a memory tester (both MemTest86 and Windows Memory Diagnostic), checked my hard drive using both "chkdsk /r" and Maxtor PowerMax Diagnostics, cleared all my CMOS settings back to fail-safe defaults, and tried replacing my viaide.sys driver with the lastest version. Unfortunately, none of these things fixed the problem. As a side note, yes, it does let me boot up with a boot floppy, a boot CD, and the XP Recovery Console.

Now here's something new that I've discovered: I was trying to focus on booting up in Safe Mode, since Safe Mode is kind enough to actually print out the names of the drivers as it loads them. First, I disabled the "atapi.sys" driver because I knew that would cause a Stop Message, and I wanted to see which drivers got loaded before that Stop Message. Here is exactly what Safe Mode printed to the screen:

Code: 
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\ntoskrnl.exe
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\hal.dll
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\KDCOM.DLL
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\BOOTVID.DLL
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\config\system
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\c_1252.nls
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\c_437.nls
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\l_intl.nls
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\FONTS\vgaoem.fon
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\AppPatch\drvmain.sdb
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\ACPI.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\pci.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\isapnp.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\ohci1394.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\1394BUS.SYS
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\WMILIB.SYS
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\viaide.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\PCIIDEX.SYS
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\MountMgr.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\ftdisk.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\dmload.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\PartMgr.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\VolSnap.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\hpt3xx.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\SCSIPORT.SYS
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\disk.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\CLASSPNP.SYS
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\fltMgr.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\hptpro.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\KSecDD.sys
[B]<Stop Message happens right here>[/B]

Then, I re-enabled "atapi.sys" so I could see how much farther it could get in loading the drivers, and for some reason it got less far. This is what happened:

Code: 
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\ntoskrnl.exe
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\hal.dll
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\KDCOM.DLL
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\BOOTVID.DLL
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\config\system
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\c_1252.nls
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\c_437.nls
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\system32\l_intl.nls
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\FONTS\vgaoem.fon
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\AppPatch\drvmain.sdb
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\ACPI.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\pci.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\isapnp.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\ohci1394.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\1394BUS.SYS
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\WMILIB.SYS
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\viaide.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\PCIIDEX.SYS
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\MountMgr.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\ftdisk.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\dmload.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\PartMgr.sys
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS\Drivers\VolSnap.sys
[B]<Restart happens right here!!>[/B]

So, as you can see, when atapi.sys is enabled, the restart happens right at the point where hpt3xx.sys would get loaded, yet if atapi.sys is disabled it can successfully get through hpt3xx.sys. Does that make any sense to anybody?? Because I am at a total loss here, folks.

Your thoughts?
 
Sounds like an IRQ conflict to me. You wouldn't happen to have a creative card in there would you?
 
not an irq conflict. definitely. that gives you a message. sounds like you got a bad hard drive, or a "scrambled eggs" boot sector virus... "scrambled eggs" isnt the name of anything, i just call 'em that because they scramble your comp like eggs in a pan.
 
Yeah I kind of agree with the above post, could be a messed up boot sector or something. I would try to find something similar to ERD Commander where you can enter a preinstallation environment and use regedit. BartPE builder might allow you to do that but I haven't tried it. Then see if it will boot into the preinstallation environment, basically see if it will make it that far. Then if it does see if you can run regedit, and turn off auto-reboot, which is located in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\CrashControl, then change AutoReboot from 1 to 0. Then when the issue happens again you will be able to see the actual error message. Then you can have a better idea of what is happening.

Other than that, it sounds like maybe your MBR got messed up or something.
 
starhawk said:
not an irq conflict. definitely. that gives you a message. sounds like you got a bad hard drive, or a "scrambled eggs" boot sector virus... "scrambled eggs" isnt the name of anything, i just call 'em that because they scramble your comp like eggs in a pan.
Click to expand...
If I'm not mistaken the bar he is referring to is the grey bar at the bottom of the screen such as the one in 2K. That's when services and drivers start to load. The MBR would have been gone by at that point.

I can't count how many times my MSI raid board did the same exact thing with the creative card in it. The sound card and the raid controller are most likely on the same IRQ. The bad news is that they are both IRQ locked at least mine were.
 
if nothing else works, do a clean install of windows.

:rolleyes: if that doesn't work, follow the steps below:

(1) get a really strong magnet from Lowe's or Home Depot.
(2) with the computer off, disconnect all external cables from the case, then open it.
(3) remove all connectors from the hard drive(s)
(4) *carefully* remove all parts that can be sold for mucho $$ or can be reused in a new comp
(5) wave the magnet over the drives for about 15 min/drive.
(6) close the case.
(7) open the nearest window as far as it will go.
(8) pick up the computer and take it to the window.
(9) heave-ho!
(10) get a shovel.
(11) go outside to about where the computer landed.
(12) dig a really big hole.
(13) dump the remains of the comp in the hole.
(14) fill up the hole.

:D if you do the 2nd one, post pics!!!
 
Kind of a reach here, but I had the same reboot loop triggered by two things:

1) a CPU pushed too far

2) turning off ACPI in the BIOS on a machine with an existing install of Win XP

The revert-to-default-settings work in the BIOS should have fixed any possiblity of the latter, and probably the former as well. Good luck on this one.
 
happened to my bosses laptop last week. he isntalled Sp2 then rolled it back. never booted again. plus the only you can boot on the crappy thing (fuji lifebook) is the hard drive.

ended up doing a clean install of 2k. 2k is like the happy little quiet place you can go affter a big night out with xp.
 
yikes. i had a similar problem once, only it was win98 and a hard drive failure...

i was on vacation, and had my mom's canon s3 printer (but not the driver cd of course). so i try and set it up, the comp freezes, and, upon reboot, the bios firmly declares that there is no hard drive in the computer.

arrg.

on top of everything else, mom is a computer illiterate attorney. by choice. she knows how to turn it on and off, but she didn't know (until last night) that her wireless keyboard had batteries. she doesn't know, understand, or care too, the innards of a computer.

so now there is a perfectly good 133mhz p1 in the closet. we can't get rid of it because it has confidential attorney stuff on it, and i don't have a professional disk eraser. i was crazy enough to try and open the d*** thing (i'll never do *that* again... geez) but nothing was visibly wrong.
 
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